﻿﻿The Home﻿of Boxing News & DiscussionIn Australia﻿﻿﻿

Sakio Bika to fight for WBC Light Heavyweight Title﻿

By TOM WATT on Feb 18th 2015

TEXT

After taking some time off to complete a documentary film on his life,Sakio Bika has announced his next fight. Not only is the Cameroon-born Australian jumping straight back into another World Title fight, but he’s doing it at a higher weight, taking on the colossal, Adonis ‘Superman’ Stevenson on April 4th as one of the first fights to be shown as part of CBS and Showtime’s new joint venture.

This will be without doubt be one of Bika’s hardest fights in his career, since capturing the WBC crown in 2013, Stevenson has destroyed all thos in front of him including England’s Tony Bellew who has since moved up to the Cruiserweight division and taken apart Welshman, and former Kovalev victim, Nathan Cleverly. Despite his 5 straight victories as champion, Stevenson has come under some fire for his choice of opponent – or more so his avoidance of the bigger names in the division, most notably the aforementioned Sergey ‘Krusher’ Kovalev and the ever-popular Bernard ‘The Alien’ Hopkins – so this fight will no doubt be met with negativity from some areas of the boxing fraternity as Bika lost his last fight at 168lbs and has never fought at 175lbs.

That is none of the former Olympian’s concern though, he has managed to secure himself another World Title shot and now it’s up to him to bring that famous green belt back to Australian shores. A jump in weight could be just what Bika needs to re-ignite his career, having looked very drained to make weight for the Dirrell fight at the StubHub last year and with the added weight we may well see a return to the all-action, high-pressure Bika that we have all grown to love.

However with Bika’s tendency to get involved in a tear-up, he will need to be aware that he is stepping into the ring with a very dangerous man, ‘Superman’ is a superb specimen of a human being and has racked up 21 KOs in his 25 wins so Bika will need to make sure that he fights smart and doesn’t become the 22nd man to feel the extent of Stevenson’s power. If he manages to fight smart and box as well as we all know he can then Bika has a fantastic chance of frustrating his opponent into opening up and that is when we will see how he responds to the type of pressure that the Australian can bring.

There is a long camp ahead for both fighters and for Bika, the chance of taking home his 3rd World Title. I’m predicting a KO in the later rounds, it could go both ways but I’ll follow my heart and say that Sakio Bika will be the man with his hand raised on April 4th.